to broaden (intransitive or transitive · verb, hiphil imperative, 2nd person feminine singular
place
מְק֣וֹםme.Kom
H4725
properly · noun, common masculine singular construct
tent
אָהֳלֵ֗ךְ'o.ho.Lekh
H168
a tent (as clearly conspicuous from a distance) · noun, common masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 2nd person feminine singular
forth
יַטּ֖וּya.Tu
H5186
to stretch or spread out · verb, hiphil imperfect, 3rd person masculine plural
curtains
וִירִיע֧וֹתvi.ri.'ot
H3407
a hanging (as tremulous) · conjunction + noun, common feminine plural construct
habitations
מִשְׁכְּנוֹתַ֛יִךְmish.ke.no.Ta.yikh
H4908
a residence (including a shepherd's hut · noun, common feminine plural construct + pronominal suffix, 2nd person feminine singular
spare
תַּחְשֹׂ֑כִיtach.So.khi
H2820
to restrain or (reflex.) refrain · verb, qal jussive, 2nd person feminine singular
lengthen
הַאֲרִ֙יכִי֙ha.'a.Ri.khi
H748
to be (causative · verb, hiphil imperative, 2nd person feminine singular
cords
מֵֽיתָרַ֔יִךְmei.ta.Ra.yikh
H4340
a cord (of a tent) · noun, common masculine plural construct + pronominal suffix, 2nd person feminine singular
strengthen
חַזֵּֽקִיcha.Ze.ki
H2388
to fasten upon · verb, piel imperative, 2nd person feminine singular
stakes
וִיתֵדֹתַ֖יִךְvi.te.do.Ta.yikh
H3489
a peg · conjunction + noun, common feminine plural construct + pronominal suffix, 2nd person feminine singular
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
Isaiah 33:20 Look upon Zion, the city of our solemnities: thine eyes shall see Jerusalem a quiet habitation, a tabernacle that shall not be taken down; n…
Isaiah 49:19-20 For thy waste and thy desolate places, and the land of thy destruction, shall even now be too narrow by reason of the inhabitants, and they…
Jeremiah 10:20 My tabernacle is spoiled, and all my cords are broken: my children are gone forth of me, and they are not: there is none to stretch forth my…
Exodus 39:40 The hangings of the court, his pillars, and his sockets, and the hanging for the court gate, his cords, and his pins, and all the vessels of…
Exodus 35:18 The pins of the tabernacle, and the pins of the court, and their cords,
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Isaiah 54:1-5
If we apply this to the state of the Jews after their return out of captivity, it is a prophecy of the increase of their nation after they were settled in their own land. Jerusalem had been in the condition of a wife written childless, or a desolate solitary widow; but now it is promised that the city should be replenished and the country peopled again, that not only the ruins of Jerusalem should be repaired, but the suburbs of it extended on all sides and a great many buildings erected upon new foundations, - that those estates which had for many years been wrongfully held by the Babylonian Gentiles should now return to the right owners. God will again be a husband to them, and the reproach…
(Isa 49:19-20; Jer 31:31-36, Jer 31:38-39). Thy children shall be so many that thy borders must be extended to contain them.
curtains--the cloth forming the covering of the tent.
spare not--give abundantly the means for the enlargement of the Church (Co2 9:5-7).
cords . . . stakes--The more the tent is enlarged by lengthening the cords by which the cloth covering is fastened to the ground, the more the stakes supporting the tent need to be strengthened; the Church is not merely to seek new converts, but to strengthen those she has in the faith. The image is appropriate, as the tabernacle was the symbol of the old Israelitish Church (see on Isa 33:20).
Adam Clarke on Isaiah 54:1
Sing, O barren, thou that didst not bear "Shout for joy, O thou barren, that didst not bear" - The Church of God under the Old Testament, confined within the narrow bounds of the Jewish nation, and still more so in respect of the very small number of true believers, and which sometimes seemed to be deserted of God her husband, is the barren woman, that did not bear, and was desolate. She is exhorted to rejoice, and to express her joy in the strongest manner, on the reconciliation of her husband, (see Isa 54:6), and on the accession of the Gentiles to her family. The converted Gentiles are all along considered by the prophet as a new accession of adopted children, admitted into the original C…
Let us come to spiritual understanding. He who is in a tabernacle does not possess a firm and permanent dwelling; but he always changes places and hastens to go further, saying in the psalm: 'I will pass to the place of the wonderful tabernacle' (Ps. XLI, 5), forgetting the things that are past and extending himself into the future, until he reaches the reward of the heavenly calling. We read about this tabernacle and in another place: How lovely are your dwelling places, O LORD of hosts! My soul longs, yes, even faints for the courts of the LORD (Psalm 84:1). And it continues: Blessed are those who dwell in your house; they will praise you forever and ever (Ibid., 6). For the end of the tabernacles is the possession of the eternal house, which does not change its foundations, nor is it moved from one place to another. For those who are planted in the house of the LORD, they will flourish in the courts of our God, that they may go from flowers to fruit, and may say: But I am like a fruitful olive tree in the house of God (Psalm 52:10). Finally, the holy man, hastening to pass by the tabernacles and desiring to see the house of God, says that he has one wish, that he never leaves the house of God: One thing I have asked of the Lord, this I will seek: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life (Ps. 26:1). Therefore, the tabernacle must be enlarged, and curtains and skins must be stretched, and ropes of various and diverse discourses must be extended further, and nails must be firmly fixed on the right and left, so that the seed of the word, that is, the teaching of God, may be able to possess the nations; and to make habitable cities, which he received who doubled the mina.
(Vers. 2, 3.) Dilata locum tentorii tui, et pelles tabernaculorum tuorum extende: ne parcas: longos fac funiculos tuos, et clavos tuos consolida. Ad dexteram enim et ad laevam penetrabis, et semen tuum gentes haereditabit, et civitates desertas inhabitabit. LXX: Dilata locum tabernaculi tui, et pelles aulaeorum tuorum fige, ne parcas. Protende funiculos, et clavos tuos conforta adhuc in dextris, et in sinistris dilata, et semen tuum possidebit gentes, et civitates desertas habitare facies. To whom he had said: Praise, O barren one, who does not bear; break the bonds by which you were previously bound, and shout in confession of the Lord, whom you did not have children with, now you are commanded the same as the likeness of the tent of Moses, which he once had (Exodus 36) in the desert, to expand his tent and stretch out his skins; and make longer cords and fix nails, with which the entire tent is formed, so that it may be firmly set and strengthened, lest it be dispersed by the blasts of the wind. And it should extend to both the right and the left, and by no means should it imitate the narrowness of the Jewish tabernacle, which measured one hundred cubits in length and fifty in width, nor should it be constrained by the brevity of the Temple, which had sixty cubits in length and twenty in width. But it should continue to have space on the right and on the left. (Exodus 27). And so that we may not think this can be said in vain concerning the frivolous contention of the Hebrews about Zion, which is to be restored to its ancient state by the Lord, he explains more clearly what was hidden: And your offspring shall inherit the nations. About which we also read in the Gospel: 'He went out who sows to sow' (Matthew XIII, 3); and again: 'Did you not sow good seed in your field?' (Ibid., 27)? This seed will also make deserted cities be inhabited, so that Churches of the nations may rise in the whole world. Or surely the seed must be said to be the Apostles, and the remnants of the Jewish people. About which in this same Prophet it is said: 'Unless the Lord of hosts had left us seed, we would have been like Sodom, and similar to Gomorrah' (Isaiah I, 9). And the Apostle says: 'The remnants were saved' (Rom. II, 5). This refers to the greatness of the Churches, which, starting from one place in Judea and that too very narrow, will extend their boundaries to the whole…
Dictionary and topics
Cord · .Fastening tents — .Fastening tents
Curtains · FIGURATIVE — FIGURATIVE
Gentiles · PROPHECIES OF THE CONVERSION OF — PROPHECIES OF THE CONVERSION OF
Heathen · Their land given to Israel — Their land given to Israel
Tabernacle · Illustrative: Of the Church — Illustrative: Of the Church
Tents · Called: Curtains — Called: Curtains
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
John Gill on Isaiah 54:2
Enlarge the place of thy tent,.... To which the church is compared, because of its uncertain and movable condition, being sometimes in one place, and sometimes in another; and because of its outward meanness and weakness, as well as its small extent; but now it is signified that it should be enlarged, and room be made for an accession of in habitants to it; or, in other words, that the Gospel church state should not be confined to Jerusalem, but should take place in other parts of Judea, and in Galilee, and in Samaria; hence we read of churches in those places, Acts 9:31,
and let them stretch forth the curtains of thine habitation; alluding to the curtains of which tents or tabernacles were…
Widen the place of thy tabernacles. He continues his argument under other metaphors, and promises that the Lord will not only restore his Church, but will bestow upon her a condition far more excellent. They who think that the Church is compared in this passage to a synagogue are, in my opinion, mistaken, and only succeed in increasing the obstinacy of the Jews, who perceive that the Prophet's meaning is tortured. I do indeed acknowledge that these things relate to the kingdom of Christ, and that they were at length fulfilled as soon as the Gospel began to be preached; but it does not therefore follow that the Prophet did not, at the same time, keep his eye upon that period which preceded th…
With this prospect before her, even her dwelling-place would need enlarging. "Enlarge the space of thy tent, and let them stretch out the curtains of thy habitations; forbid not! lengthen thy cords, and fasten thy plugs." She is to widen out the space inside her tent, and they (יטּוּ has no definite subject, which is often the case where some subordinate servant is to be thought of) are to spread out far and wide the coverings of the framework of her dwelling, which is called mishkenōth (in the plural) on account of its roominess and magnificence: she is not to forbid it, thinking in her weakness of faith, "It is good enough as it is; it would be too large." The cords which hold up the wall…
This is an invitation to participate in the restoration to God’s favor made possible through the ministry of the promised servant.
54:1-17 Salvation flows from the vindication of the suffering servant. The promises mentioned here go beyond the return from Babylonian exile and apply to the coming of Jesus Christ, the extension of the kingdom to the church, the benefits of the second coming of Jesus Christ as the bridegroom of the church, and the new Jerusalem.
54:1-3 The prophet encourages Jerusalem, likened to a barren woman, to rejoice because its fate was rapidly changing. She would have so many children that she would outgrow her home (see Gal 4:27).
54:1 In the ancient world, a woman…
and let them stretch forth far off.
lengthen your cords These are thin ropes that hang at the bottom of tents, and that are tied to stakes called ‘chevills’ in French, which are thrust into the ground.
